If campaign-finance reform has made independent-issue groups the goliaths of U.S. politics, Colorado’s Senate race has become center ring in their attack ad slugfest.

Along with national party committees, those groups and their deep-pocketed funders have spent $17.3 million attacking one candidate or the other — far outpacing any other Senate races in the country and fueled by Republican groups who have outspent their Democratic counterparts more than 2-to-1.

The burning question is: Why?

Strategists say one reason is that the fight for the U.S. Senate seat has become the linchpin of a Republican counterattack aimed at turning back Democratic successes in the West, gains that have robbed the GOP of a once solidly red region and threaten — if left unchecked — to shift the national balance of power for years to come.

Across the country, there are at least five other competitive Senate races, but the attack groups have been comparatively frugal there while pouring money into Colorado as if the very balance in power in Washington depends on it.

Leave out the party committee spending, and independent groups allied to the GOP have spent $10.4 million in Colorado, while just $2.6 million in New Hampshire and $2.4 million in Minnesota, the two runners-up, data provided by Democratic media buyers show. (Attack groups supporting Democrats, by comparison, have spent $3.4 million in Colorado, $1.6 million in Minnesota, and $1.2 million in New Hampshire.)

Partly that’s because Colorado’s importance in the presidential race has raised its profile for national groups; partly it’s because the ideological differences between the two Senate candidates are among the sharpest, drawing corporations and rich individuals who see strong allies for their agendas.

The bigger picture

Operatives say that as much as the battle is about the dynamics of the race between Republican Bob Schaffer and Democrat Mark Udall, it’s also about what this contest represents.

“There is this thought if you lose Colorado and the West, if it just tips over and the federal delegation is liberal Democrats, then it’s as bad as losing the White House. Because it starts to change the electoral map for Republicans winning the presidency,” said Patrick Davis, a Republican consultant who works with independent-issue groups in Colorado and throughout the country.

Sean Tonner, a Republican consultant also working with independent-issue groups, said there is a strong effort by GOP interests nationally to counteract what’s become known as the “the Colorado model” — a string of Democratic election successes helped along by rich local donors known as the Gang of Four, including billionaires Tim Gill and Pat Stryker.

“The Republicans see that what was a traditionally a stronghold for Republicans — the West — has been slipping to the Democrats the last two cycles, and Colorado was kind of the vanguard for that. If they can turn Colorado back, then they have opportunities to turn back Arizona, to turn back Nevada, and to turn back Montana,” Tonner said.

“Here was where the Gang of Four honed and perfected the Colorado model,” Tonner said. “Now they’re exporting that to Arizona; they’re exporting it to Michigan. Being able to beat it back is what the Republicans want to be able to do,” he said.

None of that is particularly comforting for state Democrats, who have seen their Senate candidate pummeled in the last two months with a bruising array of ads.

“It puts a very despicable twist to it,” said Pat Waak, the state Democratic Party chairwoman, clearly angered.

“This is the height of cynicism and hypocrisy that I see on the Republican side, because much of what the ads are saying is totally untrue,” she said.

Negative ads work

But for Republicans, turnabout is fair play.

If the Colorado model has been partly about millionaire Democratic funders channeling huge sums into critical campaigns through independent-expenditure groups, the dynamic this year seems to be reversed.

Big Democratic donors appear to be focusing more on state legislative races and ballot initiatives, as well as a costly national convention, party insiders say. In contrast, Republican donors seem to have a laserlike focus on the Senate race.

“I think they care about the presidential race, but I think they care most about the Senate race,” Waak said of Republican efforts in Colorado.

Udall has maintained a modest lead in recent polls, and Republican-allied groups have been willing to spend millions to keep that lead as slim as possible. For their part, Democratic donors see it as a less urgent target for money because Udall is ahead.

But there is a nearly iron-clad logic about negative political ads: They work. If the barrage of attack ads does damage to Udall’s image with voters, both sides say, his deep-pocketed allies will likely jump in.

And if the attacks don’t work? Well, expect even more negative ads.

“They are committed to this race,” Tonner said of the independent-issue groups.

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